Romney emerges unscathed as other candidates attack each other

MANCHESTER, N.H. — The five Republican candidates trying to emerge as the alternative to front-runner Mitt Romney engaged in fratricidal combat on a stage at St. Anselm College Saturday night as the former Massa­chusetts governor grinned at the theatrics while aiming his political barbs at President Barack Obama.

With just three days remaining before New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary, the candidates trailing Romney in the polls decided to battle each other for second place rather than focusing on the candidate running far ahead of them in the polls.

Romney smiled as the other candidates attacked each other and defended his record against occasional, mild attacks from GOP rivals. But he repeatedly skewered the Democratic incumbent’s economic record and foreign policy.

“His policies have made the recession deeper and his policies have made the recovery more tepid,” Romney said of Obama.

The ABC News debate was the first of two nationally televised encounters in 12 hours. The candidates will reconvene 15 miles north for an 8 a.m. CST face-off in Concord on Sunday.

The back-to-back weekend debates are the last chance to slow Romney’s momentum before New Hampshire voters cast their ballots Tuesday. Polls show the former Massachusetts governor running more than 20 percentage points ahead of his opponents in New Hampshire and vaulting into the lead in the next state to hold a primary, South Carolina.

University of Virginia government professor Larry Sabato called the debate “a classic case of a front-runner winning by hiding in plain sight.”

Perry blasts ‘insiders’

As Romney watched, the other candidates repeatedly ripped into each other. Texas Rep. Ron Paul, running second in recent New Hampshire polls, was at the center of the conflict during the debate. He denounced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich as a “chicken hawk” who avoided military service during the Vietnam War, and called former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum “corrupt” and “a big spender.”

Both reacted furiously, with Santorum saying Paul had made “a ridiculous charge” and was “not telling the truth.”

“Well, Dr. Paul has a long history of saying things that are inaccurate and false,” a furious Gingrich chimed in. “The fact is, I never asked for deferment. I was married with a child … And I personally resent the kind of comments and aspersions he routinely makes without accurate information and then just slurs people with.”

“When I was drafted,” Paul shot back, “I was married and had two kids and I went.”

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, placed on the far-right podium after his fifth-place finish in Tuesday’s Iowa caucuses, used his rare questions to demonize his rivals — except for former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman — as corrupt insiders.

“It doesn’t make any difference whether you’re an insider from Washington, D.C., or you’re an insider from Wall Street,” he said, contending that Americans are looking for “an outsider that is not corrupted by the process.”

Perry also blasted fellow Texan Paul for seeking federal projects for the Lone Star State while speaking out against federal spending.

“In Texas, we call that hypocrisy,” Perry said.

“I call that being a constitutionalist,” Paul responded.

Criticism of Romney was rare during the 100-minute debate. Huntsman noted that Romney’s job-creation record as Massachusetts governor was 47th in the nation while Utah led the nation. And Santorum said he was a “leader” while Romney, a former venture capitalist and CEO of the Winter Olympics, was “a manager.”

Mandarin got laughs

Indeed, Romney was more critical of the others — particularly Huntsman, whom he accused of being soft on China.

Huntsman, a former U.S. envoy to Beijing, provoked audience laughter by responding in Mandarin: “He doesn’t exactly understand the situation.”
Santorum is trying to capitalize on his better-than-expected second-place finish in Iowa to become the leading choice of conservatives who believe Romney is too moderate.

He told the audience that Republicans are “looking for someone who can win the race” against Obama and argued that he had “appeal to blue-collar workers” that could help the

GOP reclaim states including Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana from the Democratic incumbent.

The Pennsylvanian’s response was one of many that seemed to be speaking to an audience far beyond New Hampshire.

Perry, who is not campaigning in New Hampshire before the primary and planned to head for South Carolina after Sunday’s debate, accused the administration of engaging in “a war against religion … and it’s going to stop in a Perry administration.”

Romney argued that marriage between a man and a woman is “a recognition for society as a whole that the nation simply will be better off where children are raised in a setting” with both a male and a female.

Only Huntsman — while saying he supports “one man, one woman” for marriage — expressed strong support for same sex civil unions, calling them no threat to marriage and a legal avenue that lends “dignity” to relationships.